


Thread Tugged Through

by SiladhielLithvirax



Series: LithWritesSpookyWars [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Body Horror, DarksiderMagic, Gen, Non-Consensual, Obi-Wan Kenobi Needs a Hug, Other, Possession, Qui-Gon Jinn's A+ Parenting, Sith Magic & Rituals (Star Wars), SpookyWarsWeekPrompt, not qui-gon jinn friendly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2020-10-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:29:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27188668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SiladhielLithvirax/pseuds/SiladhielLithvirax
Summary: He stepped up and nudged the slightest of Force touches against the pyramid, stepping back as the red light grew stronger and symbols appeared on the walls of his study.This would work, this had to work.Otherwise, it was all for nothing.
Series: LithWritesSpookyWars [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1984732
Comments: 21
Kudos: 84
Collections: Spooky Wars Week





	Thread Tugged Through

**Author's Note:**

> This is a response for mneiai's Spooky Wars Challenge, 
> 
> Today's prompt was "Darksider Magic"

There was a Holocron. 

It pulsed red and black leaving a heavy charge hanging in the air, like the moment before a lightning storm on Dubrillion.    
  
He stepped up and nudged the slightest of Force touches against the pyramid, stepping back and the red light grew stronger and symbols appeared on the walls of his study. 

This would work, this  _ had _ to work. 

Otherwise, it was all for nothing. 

* * *

  
  


He massaged his temple with two fingers, catching the slight tilt of his Commander’s helmet in the corner of his eye and quickly shifting to run a hand through his beard. 

Exhaustion was okay, exhaustion was even expected. 

A migraine, like the one that pulsed through his skull and refused every kind of Force soothing, would mean medics and nagging and nothing he wants to deal with. 

Tea would help. After this briefing on the situation at Ryloth they had a three rotation journey to the front. 

He could rest. He would be fine. He had to be fine. 

* * *

  
  


The red pyramid mocked him. 

He would not be castigated by a pyramid. He would not. 

Bathed in the light of the red characters on the wall, he bends over to transcribe another combination. 

It worked, everything he has translated and retranslated said it would be effective. 

So why did it seem like the same paltry state of affairs? 

* * *

  
  


There was a pounding in the base of his skull, different from the normal tension that stretched across his temples. This pain seemed to heave and groan, nestled right next to where he was attached to the bright nova star presence of Anakin in his mind. 

His fingers clenched harder around his saber as he batted bolts away and waved his men forward.

Meditation was ineffective to alleviate the pounding, any peace he could find shuddered and twisted away upon nearing the relentless throbbing settled in his mind.

There was something whispering at the edges of his senses, some long-forgotten feeling that he really just  _ could not deal with at this moment. _   
  
“Commander! Prepare for reinforcement along the front 3 klicks east!”

“Yes Sir, Resh squad incoming in 20!” 

There wasn’t time to deal with the relentless pressure in his mind, there was the battle in front of him and the men at his back. He would not let them down. 

* * *

He could almost feel it, this deep in the Force, this deep in the swirling currents and shifting depths. 

That thin gossamer string connecting him to the part of the Force that held his late padawan was stretched taught, spinning and shining and throbbing with what felt like pain. 

There was not supposed to be pain, there was supposed to be the shade of his presence coalescing into an entity with which he could communicate and feel. 

Something had gone wrong. Something was not right. 

His eyes snapped open, a poisonous yellow glaring into the distance. 

He should have never trusted that Sith Ritual. 

* * *

  
  


His hands were shaking. 

His hands were shaking and his head was pounding and it was all he could do to let all of these feelings go into the Force and keep his grip on his wrists behind his back. 

“Admiral, direct the Aureck squad to utilize the Rancor formation and guard the left flank.” 

“Yes sir!” 

There was something wrong. There was something that was not right. 

There was the gnawing pain in his head and the minute trembling of his hands and the klaxons and alarms and the Force was shuddering and heaving around him as he watches ships blow apart and dive through space like toys in the hands of the younglings in the creche. 

The great ship rocked, and yet more alarms were whirling and shrieking and there was a yawning in his mind as something was pulled taught, something was pulling and ripping and his mind was a ship navigating the storm of the Force, buffeted by the swirling and rippling currents. 

“General, there are updated readouts ready on the table.” 

“Thank you, Admiral, prepare for engagement on the right flank in seven minutes.” 

He blew out a breath and stepped forward to meet the challenge. 

* * *

  
  


He kept it together until the door to his quarters closed. Immediately leaning back against the door and sliding down until his head rested against his drawn up knees. 

This was not a great position to be in he knew, but getting through the last hour of post-battle debrief and recovery was almost unbearably hard. 

Cody knew something had been wrong. His head tilting ever so carefully to keep Obi-Wan in his sight no matter where on the ship they were. 

He was at least cognizant enough to hide the tremors in the wide sleeves of his robes when motioning as needed over the holo displays. Concentrating on the numbers and displays was difficult with the ringing and throbbing that had yet to abate in the base of his skull. Yet now he was back in his room, alone and finally free to fall apart at the seams. 

There was a knocking at the door he absently noticed as Cody before the pain in his head made him close his eyes from the too-bright light of his quite dark quarters. 

The ringing and knocking seemed to finally fill his ears as he pressed his forehead tight into his knees, jaw aching with tension. He tries to take a deep breath, tries to pull the roiling mass of the Force through his body but it shies away in jagged skips and starts as if he no longer belonged. 

The Force had been his constant ally. Through years of nightmarish visions, years of a strained training bond, years of Anakin’s star-bright presence almost flooding his own, the Force had never abandoned him before. 

He wondered how he felt to Anakin now. His shields had only grown more impenetrable over the course of the war, but he didn’t quite have the wherewithal to check on the barriers blocking his mind from his former Padawan, his mind really just a choppy sea of pain and ringing and that ever-present tugging toward some far off thing. 

There was a swirl of grey straining towards the place in his mind next to where Anakin’s bond now lay, a gossamer-thin strand stretched taught, spinning and shining and throbbing. 

Oh, something was very wrong. 

He had a single thought for Cody still pounding on his door when the swirl finally touched the base of that ripped out training bond from so long ago. His mind was engulfed in a wave of white and gray and- 

* * *

  
  


He felt tired, yet peaceful. He felt as if he was floating in a lake that didn’t have an end. It was nice here. It was quiet. 

  
  
  


He could stay here. 

He didn't know how he knew that, but the gentle swaying around him and through him was a balm to his nerves and mind. 

He tried to take a breathe but something was wrong. He went through the motions slower this time, expanding his chest and drawing in air as well as he could but- 

There was no air. 

Only years of deep meditation and his familiarity with visions let him think past the first surge of panic that threatened to drown him. 

There was no air, but he had quite a bit of experience with the depths of the Force and its mysteries, he did not get his Mastery of Soresu Battle Meditation from just skimming the top of the eddies always swirling through the galaxy. 

The first step was to check in with his senses. 

Wrenching his eyes open was like stepping into the light of a consuming star. 

_ Light-colors-greys-dark blues and the brightest yellow being overtaken by the angriest red and the shadows intertwining through it all, like a noose the shadow tensed, and the bright blinding light was made smaller and smaller, scattering in a dazzling array only to reform and the noose was still there but the light- _

He recognized this view. He  _ remembered  _ this imagery. 

Half forgotten dreams came to him then, the nightmares and visions that had so often plagued him in the dark of the creche. Those memories were clearer now. Reflected back at him in the form of the neverending struggle playing out before him right now. 

This was not the Living Force he was submerged in, this was the Unifying Force. 

That cosmic power that connected the past to the future to the present and through all time. 

But something nagged at him. 

There should be a tether, something grounding him to his own place in the insignificant place in the tapestry before him, some tug or thread he can use to surface from the vision he’s in right now. 

Just thinking about it makes something appear, another gossamer thread, more silver than normal, dim and frayed and he tugs it and-

* * *

  
  


He’s back on the Negotiator, looking down at the prone form of his body in the medbay, various machines and monitors hooked up to his torso and head. 

He can’t quite seem to make the last link to his physical form, as tenuous and frayed as the thread is, and something is blocking him, like a wall of glass slammed up across the doorway into his own mind. 

The emergence of Helix scrambles his thoughts as the medic walks through the partition, clipboard in hand, and notes something down, staring into the face of the body on the bed. Obi-Wan can’t influence the waking world like this, still half a step removed from the Living force and with the Unifying force flowing through him. 

Helix leaves and he tries again to force his way through that glass, tries to let himself flow into that which he is, but he feels stuck where he is, like an observer for the holo show that is his life. 

Something responds to his actions through the glass, the wall shudders and something seems to unfurl behind it as the body on the bed flutters its eyes and finally wakes up. 

The normal blue is corrupted, yellow swirling around the pupils that narrow on the spot where he is having his out of body experience. 

An expression settles onto that familiar face, jarring and so comparable to one he remembers from years long ago. 

The expression that watched him from the salle locker room and pronounced him too angry and unworthy. 

The expression he saw as he handed over his lightsaber, the Force urging him onwards as his heart broke over the forfeiture of his dream. 

The expression he last saw after the Naboo Council Meeting that still fills him with despair years and years later. 

The expression that said,  _ I am your master, and you are not enough.  _

Obi-Wan’s breathing was fast and shallow, for all that he obviously no longer needed the air. 

The face before him, copper hair, beard, and those rippling eyes all settled into a smile as it continued staring at him. 

"Hello my Padawan, I have to thank you for the use of your body," arms flexed and cracked as the body of Obi-Wan Kenobi stretched and groaned. 

"It seems I have much to do these days, High General and Councilor Kenobi hmm?" Legs swung out from under the blankets and eyes swirling with colors finally snapped back to meet his own disembodied ones,

"May the Force be with you, Obi-Wan Kenobi."


End file.
